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(as of Mar 09, 2025 02:42:55 UTC – Details)
An instant New York Times Bestseller • Finalist for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize • A Read with Jenna Today Show Book Club Pick
“A thrilling debut that deserves your attention.” —Ron Charles, Washington Post
“Exceptional. . . . Wetmore, like Harper Lee before her, has little interest in preserving the illusions of people who believe that justice and love will always prevail. . . . An incredibly moving and emotionally devastating piece of work.” — Houston Chronicle
Written with the haunting emotional power of Elizabeth Strout and Barbara Kingsolver, an astonishing debut novel that explores the lingering effects of a brutal crime on the women of one small Texas oil town in the 1970s.
Mercy is hard in a place like this . . .
It’s February 1976, and Odessa, Texas, stands on the cusp of the next great oil boom. While the town’s men embrace the coming prosperity, its women intimately know and fear the violence that always seems to follow.
In the early hours of the morning after Valentine’s Day, fourteen-year-old Gloria Ramírez appears on the front porch of Mary Rose Whitehead’s ranch house, broken and barely alive. The teenager had been viciously attacked in a nearby oil field—an act of brutality that is tried in the churches and barrooms of Odessa before it can reach a court of law. When justice is evasive, the stage is set for a showdown with potentially devastating consequences.
Valentine is a haunting exploration of the intersections of violence and race, class and region in a story that plumbs the depths of darkness and fear, yet offers a window into beauty and hope. Told through the alternating points of view of indelible characters who burrow deep in the reader’s heart, this fierce, unflinching, and surprisingly tender novel illuminates women’s strength and vulnerability, and reminds us that it is the stories we tell ourselves that keep us alive.
From the Publisher
Publisher : Harper; First Edition (March 31, 2020)
Language : English
Hardcover : 320 pages
ISBN-10 : 0062913263
ISBN-13 : 978-0062913265
Item Weight : 1 pounds
Dimensions : 6 x 1.05 x 9 inches
Customers say
Customers praise the book for its well-written and poetic language. They find the story compelling and interesting, with a mesmerizing depiction of struggle and survival. The characters are described as wonderfully developed and real. Readers appreciate the vivid descriptions of the landscape, culture, and time period. They find the women’s resilience and authentic voices inspiring.
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